The Kung Fu Family - Terminology

The Kung Fu school is very much set up like a family. You will be able to find many references to this if you do a search but here are the relevant terms to the members of our school.

The head of the school (Father) is the Sifu. There can only be one Sifu in each school unless it is a school that has different instructors teaching different styles. A female would be Simo (I shudder when schools call their female instructor Sifu) and could also refer to your Sifu's wife even if she did not practice martial arts at all.

The proper way to address a Sifu from another school or style not associated with your style of Kung Fu is (last name) Sifu such as Lee Sifu. You would not refer to me, your own Sifu as Chow Sifu but only as Sifu. In Western civilization we now also sometimes switch it so the last name comes after Sifu such as when I refer to Sifu Lee.

Your Sigung (Grandfather) is your Sifu's instructor, in our case it is Grandmaster Chen Rong En but also includes anyone that was an instructor of your Sifu in the past such as Chan Tai San in our case. Our Jo-Si (founder) is Leung Tin Chiu.

Students that are senior to you within the class should be referred to as Si Hing or Si Jeh in the case of a senior female student. Students that are junior to you are referred to as Si Dai or Si Mui if female. These terms refer to your fellow students as older brother/sister and younger brother/sister. To further clarify who you are referring to, the most senior student is referred to as Dai Si Hing/Jeh (Eldest brother/sister) and could count down from there to Yee Si Hing/Jeh (2nd older brother/sister), etc.

The other terms that may come up in our school would be Si-Bak which refers to your instructor's Si Hing (in our case that would be my brother Chow Wun Dak "Dick") and means older uncle. Si-Sook is the proper way to address your Sifu's Si Dai and refers to a younger uncle...there are quite a few of these that you could meet over time.

Keep in mind that we refer to elder and younger but do not mean by age. The only thing that determines seniority is amount of time as a member of the school. This does not have anything to do with belt/sash level
or the ability level of the students. You cannot surpass another student in seniority no matter how much more knowledge you possess or ability you have. Your Si Hing is always your Si Hing.